


love will not break your heart but dismiss your fears

by perfectlight



Series: every wise man's son doth know [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: British tabloids are a plot device, Gen, I think?, Parent!lock, ellipses are overused, present tense is golden tense
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-08
Updated: 2013-04-08
Packaged: 2017-12-07 21:50:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,526
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/753481
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/perfectlight/pseuds/perfectlight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Her hair was shorter now, wisps of chestnut framing her chin, and she had more lines around her eyes, but Irene Adler would never be anyone but Irene Adler, even if she looked slightly different, and if someone was desperate enough to find her, they would.</p><p>That would be no sort of life for a – a child.</p>
            </blockquote>





	love will not break your heart but dismiss your fears

Irene Adler grips the edge of the sink and throws up.

It’s not the first time this has happened, and if she was a little less clever, she would have considered it nothing but a bad flu. She is, after all, a recent transplant to New York, and certainly there are new viruses around her, germs she hasn’t had shots for, and in a big, filthy city like this one…

But Irene is far too clever to make assumptions, and she knows what happened the night that Sherlock saved her. And she knows exactly how suspicious it is that the nausea only strikes her in the mornings. Still, she lives in denial for some time, putting the morning sickness down to a new city, the extreme emotions to stress, the mood swings to the pressures of a new job – she’s no longer a dominatrix, only an opera singer in tatty New York clubs. Irene pretends that her life will be exactly the way it is now forever, and ignores all the signs.

…

There are still people who want to kill her. _Killers_ , she thinks one night, smiling in spite of herself, curled up on a squishy mattress amidst tangled sheets and failing to keep equally tangled thoughts out of her mind. Old enemies, affairs turned sour, lovers turned haters, and if anyone had escaped Sherlock’s sword that night, there would be terrorists after her head, too. Her hair was shorter now, wisps of chestnut framing her chin, and she had more lines around her eyes, but Irene Adler would never be anyone but Irene Adler, even if she looked slightly different, and if someone was desperate enough to find her, they would.

That would be no sort of life for a – a _child._

…

Moriarity is arrested and Sherlock Holmes will witness in the trial of the century. Irene reads it all online in British tabloids and drums her fingers against the desk anxiously, scarlet nails tapping once, twice, thrice. She rests her chin on her palm and allows herself to worry. Moriarity would never be arrested, he was too clever. He wanted to be taken in. There was no possibility that this would end well.

…

The day Moriarity is released is the day that he takes tea with Sherlock is the day that Irene Adler gives up. As Jim is tapping his knee and carving letters into an apple, Irene is across the world in an American shop, trying her hardest to look inconspicuous in a ridiculously huge sweatshirt, purchasing a slim, white pregnancy test. She returns to the flat, uses it, throws the sweatshirt in a corner and returns to the tabloids.

…

Sherlock Holmes falls from the roof of Saint Bartholomew’s and leaks his blood across the sidewalk and dies but doesn’t die, lives and destroys the life of his only true friend, and far across the world Irene Adler reads the headlines and reads the test and for the first time since her code and her heart were cracked, she cries.

A suicide.

A pink line.

He’s not dead, of course, and she knows it. But he would be gone for a long, long while. And Irene has absolutely no idea what to do.

…

Eventually her stomach pushes out too far and she can’t fit into her slinky opera dresses anymore. So Irene quits that job and drifts around, taking tiny positions that never last longer than a week or so, boring things that would be almost demeaning to her if her entire life hadn’t flipped to the side and imploded and inverted itself around the tiny being inside of her. Eventually she settles on working an anonymous advice column for a magazine, and can see even more fully Sherlock’s frustration with the whims and whittles of ordinary lives. Who even would _care_ if they caught a boyfriend of hardly a year with another woman? There are billions upon billions of other men in the world and _so many_ things to be done with them - not to mention the women.

She laces her fingers together and stares at the dark font until it seems to pulsate from her computer screen, the cursor blinking in unison. When she hits the delete button, there is a curl of unsettlement twining in her stomach - Irene is changing, without even realizing it.

…

Irene eventually goes to an obstetrician and cries when she sees the fuzzy figure of her son shifting on the monitor. It almost looks like he’s running, and that makes her cry all the more – _bloody hormones_ – because he’s already reminding her of his father, forever darting through cases and crimes and London and lives. Sneaking into her heart, just like Sherlock did.

Sherlock is still dead, to the world. As the obstetrician – a kind American lady, all soft angles and flyaway hair – hands her a tissue, Irene decides. Irene knows Sherlock is alive, but that mad detective would never be able to raise a son without his good doctor. The baby would stay with Irene until Sherlock returned to Baker Street, and Irene would have to try her best to protect him until then.

On the cab ride home, Irene rubs her hand over the lump in her stomach and promises herself she isn’t being selfish.

…

Time passes. Sherlock is still dead. Irene watches from afar, using tabloids and forums and rumors to see John mourn. She pretends it doesn’t effect her, but she cries when she reads the blog post – _he was my best friend and I’ll always believe in him._ Bloody, _bloody_ hormones.

…

It didn’t seem that her world could invert on itself any more than it already had, but at precisely 7:59:07 PM, EST, on the fourth of July, Irene Adler holds a tiny screaming bundle of squishy red in her arms and is completely oblivious to the fireworks outside. The world turns and coils and everything Irene has ever done or said doesn’t seem to matter anymore. The wailing, flailing bundle is everything. She can’t stop looking at him, convincing herself that he is real. The hair and the eyes and the lips are his father’s, but the cheeks and the nose and the ears are hers.

“A beautiful boy,” one of the nurses beams, and Irene can only nod faintly. They cluck and chuckle and take the baby away to weigh him and prick him with some shots and Irene can barely breathe until he’s back in her arms again.

All she wants now is to keep him safe.

…

Irene needs a name to put on the birth certificate and she immediately selects Hamish. Hamish Holmes. She hasn’t forgotten John’s words, or the way she and Sherlock stared at each other while he said them. And besides, Irene likes the way the name sounds, the way it slips from the tongue. Hamish. Her Hamish. And if his son reminds him of his John in any way, it might soften Sherlock, when Irene gives him Hamish.

She tries not to think about that day.

…

Sherlock Holmes is still dead and John Watson still mourns and visits his grave every week, sometimes talking, sometimes crying, sometimes pleading, sometimes cursing. Irene Adler is still alive and so is Hamish, growing bigger every day – every second, it seems to Irene, who falls asleep every night wishing the day did not have to end – his hair darkening and tangling, his eyes, if possible, growing even bluer. He doesn’t cry much when he’s very young, but whenever he does Irene slips over to his cradle, holds him and rocks him and croons him, sometimes until the sun creeps over the edge of the New York skyline. It amazes her, sometimes, exactly how devoted she is to her son. It is to be expected, of course. Anyone Irene ever cared about thinks she is dead. Hamish is her entire world.

Months pass, and her world changes. Hamish is an early talker, a late walker. He steals pieces of Irene’s bread and stubbornly gnaws them with stubs of teeth, yet treats comfortably mashed peas as though they are the food of the devil. Irene tries them herself one day, and barely manages not to throw up. Hamish giggles, and it almost sounds smug.

“You’re your father’s boy,” Irene hums, wiping pea from the side of her mouth and vowing never to give it to Hamish again.

…

She wants to take every second and clasp it to her forever, as if each moment was a bead on an endless necklace strung all around her life. She settles for remembering.

…

Hamish is two and a half the day Sherlock Holmes returns from the dead. Irene is finishing another column and is about to send it to her editor when she sees the headlines on the tabloids she tracks. Almost frantically she types in the address for John’s blog.

The army doctor confirms it. Sherlock Holmes is alive again.

Irene slumps back in her seat and puffs out several strange, contradictory breaths – half laughs, half sobs; he is back and it means Hamish can be protected; he is back and it means she will have to send Hamish away.

The tiny boy sees her sliding down in her seat and shuffles over in stocking feet to tug on her finger. “Mummy?”

Irene scoops Hamish up, plopping him down on her lap and letting him tap on the keyboard for a few moments. His favorite keys are F2 and the spacebar – the spacebar, because it makes the loudest clacking noise, and F2 because it makes the screen brighter. After a minute of this, Hamish loses interest and twists to face his mummy. “Red,” he chirps, pointing at her lipstick, and Irene smiles.

She tells Hamish to look at the picture in the tabloids and he tips his head curiously. Irene opens her mouth to say _this is your father_ – then freezes. Hamish is still so little. He won’t remember her saying this within a few years. Her heart stutters painfully as she thinks, not for the first time: he won’t remember her.

By the time the tears have been blinked from Irene’s eyes, Hamish is busy tapping the spacebar again.

…

Sherlock Holmes returned from the dead, and perhaps it ignited suspicion in some of their shared enemies, for a world that used to think Irene Adler was dead suddenly doesn’t seem too sure.

Sometimes she thinks the flat is being watched and takes Hamish out on long walks until her suspicions go away. Sometimes she knows the flat is being watched and takes her little boy for longer walks, playing the part of an ordinary single mother, getting Hamish an ice-cream cone and wiping the smears of vanilla from his chubby cheeks with a laugh, all the while keeping a wary eye on the people around them and the handbag concealing her gun close by her side. There are days when so many old enemies crowd around them that Irene can hardly breathe, what if the next stalker was the one to attack? What if the one to attack is the one that hurts Hamish?

…

Irene knows, and really she knew all along. She was selfish, so, so selfish. Her heart had ruled her head again. Hamish would never be safe with her.

And maybe her head would be freed when her heart broke.

…

Hamish is three and intensely curious, Mummy seems to have gone half wild, packing up their things all in a flurry and muttering under her breath. He sits quietly and draws faces on the pictures in the New York Times, occasionally squinting hard at the paper when he thinks he recognizes a word. His overalls and toothpaste and puzzles are thrown into a suitcase, Mummy’s clothes are tossed haphazardly into another. It goes on as the sun angles from the skyscraper windows into their flat, until there is nothing left but an empty desk and lumpy sofa and the closed door to the bedroom.

Irene finally stops, takes a breath, looks around. Glancing up from the newspaper, Hamish sees his mother standing in the flat – it looked so tiny and yet so big with everything gone – and admires the way the sunlight glances off her brown hair and reflects in her eyes, making her look like an angel. Hamish had seen other children’s mummies, and none of them were nearly as pretty as his.

Hauling the bags behind her, Mummy motions for Hamish to roll up the newspaper and stick it in his pocket. Then she takes him by the hand. “Come along, darling.”

“Where?” asks Hamish curiously, as they leave the flat, the door closes before he can get a last look.

Irene bites her lip, some of the crimson lipstick staining her teeth. “To London,” she says finally. “To your daddy.”

The curiosity increases tenfold.

…

In the taxi to the airport, Mummy answers some of Hamish’s questions and then shows him a picture of a man in a sheet, with dark curly hair and a disgruntled expression. “This is your daddy,” she says softly, with her beautiful voice in some muddled place between sadness and affection and jealousy.

Frowning at the picture, Hamish tips his head first one way and then the other. “Is he a’ways in a blanket?”

Mummy laughs, and says no, Sherlock had had a special client that day. It was the first time he had met her, too.

…

London isn’t like New York, but it is a little bit, with soaring buildings and a river and crowds. Except the people talk differently, their voices rounder the way his and Mummy’s sound, instead of flat and low the way Americans do. And the cabs are wrong, big and black with glaring orange lights, instead of small and bright yellow. Mummy does take him in a London cab, however, and Hamish decides he likes them; there’s much more space, and it’s cleaner, and there are seats facing the front and the back. Fascinated by these, he sits in one backwards seat the whole ride to his daddy’s flat – 221b Baker Street, Mummy had told him, saying it over and over until she was sure Hamish would remember – pressing his nose against the window and watching the Thames sparkle as they pass.

…

A new city, a new flat, a new daddy. Hamish has never been more excited.

…

Except, when they reach 221b Baker Street and approach the black door with the shiny letters, no one is home. “As I expected,” Irene nods, her voice brisk but her eyes brimming. “It’ll be easier this way.”

She takes a pin from her chestnut hair and executes an impressive trick that Hamish has seen a few times before, sticking the pin in the lock and shifting it a little bit until the lock clicked open. The door opens to a cool hallway with patterned wallpaper, and Hamish bounds inside, jaunty with excitement, skipping halfway up the stairs before Mummy had even slid the door shut.

There is only one door open at the top of the stairs, and it leads to a room filled with the most fascinating things: bubbling beakers on the kitchen table, more patterned wallpaper, papers and thumbtacks connected by string upon one wall, a cushioned armchair, a desk with a laptop still whirring, a couch, and windows that overlook the entire street. Hamish makes his way more slowly now, staring with wide eyes and gasping with surprise when he realizes there is an entire human _foot_ sitting crusted with dried blood upon the table.

Irene follows Hamish into the room and the tears in her eyes pool until she can barely see the small figure of the little boy gazing about in wonderment.

It’s time.

…

Hamish puckers his eyebrows in confusion, the expression so endearing that Irene wants to sob. “You’re leav’ng’? Mummy why?”

Carefully, Irene kneels down before Hamish and clasps his hands. “You’re going to stay with your father now, my darling. And his friend, John Watson – you remember, I told you about them.”

“Bu’ why?”

Her eyes gleam even brighter and Hamish is even more confused. Is she crying? Should he be frightened?

“Hamish, do you remember when we went for long walks? And when I told you to keep it secret that I had a gun in my purse?”

Hamish nods with some pride, he was an excellent secret-keeper, as Mummy often said.

“It’s because–” Irene worries her lip, elects for honesty – she may never be able to speak to Hamish again – and moves her hands to the sides of his arms. “Darling, there are bad people out there, who want to hurt Mommy. I can’t let them find you. I _can’t_ lose you. But you’ll be safe here, with Sherlock and John.”

He shakes his head, dark hair flopping. “Don’t wanna be safe. You can stay wif us!”

Irene shakes her head, once, twice, tears brimming over her eyes and slipping down her cheeks like clinging raindrops. “I can’t. Oh, darling, I can’t, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry…” She murmurs it over and over, I’m sorry, enfolding Hamish in her arms tight enough to crush him. Hamish hugs her back but feels a knot of worry curl in his stomach: Mummy is shaking and crying and cold, and it’s scaring Hamish how scared she seems…

Eternity passes. Hamish doesn’t want to let go. Irene knows she must.

Impossibly slowly, she draws back, murmuring, “Your father will be home soon. Be patient, Hamish, wait for him.”

Hamish nods, wanting to clasp her hand and never let go. Why would anyone want to hurt his mummy? He hopes that all the bad people end up in the mugshots in his newspapers so they can never ever hurt Mummy again and she can stay.

Irene is crying as she lifts Hamish onto John’s armchair, and he buries his face in her shoulder as she does, clutching her shoulders. “Let go now, Hamish,” she whispers, and he thumps into the chair; each second is shattering her heart into pieces and she would rather have her head cut off this time than have to stare at those wide, frightened blue eyes–

Irene kisses Hamish’s forehead for the last time, and cups his cheek in her smooth hand as she does. “I love you, my darling. More than anything. I always will.”

Then, silently as a phantom, she is gone.

He hears her footsteps clatter down the stairs and sobs break out as the door closes. Fear tightens around Hamish’s heart, and he shrinks back in the armchair.

Hamish swallows back a wail and squeezes his eyes shut, confused and frightened and lonely. The armchair is so big, bigger than their flat had felt when it had been emptied, and Hamish feels as if he is shrinking down into the cushions, tinier than a speck of dust, soon to be lost.

If he’s lost in the cushions, that means he would be crushed under someone’s bum the next time the chair was sat in, he realizes, and the thought makes the tiniest giggle bubble from him. Elation is better than worry and Hamish allows himself to laugh, sitting up straighter in the chair and tucking his knees to his chest and studying once again the surroundings of the new flat around him. It’s messy, but it’s comfortable, and it looks like a home.

…

Warm evening light is shifting through the flat, alighting specks of dust in the air. Lazily, Hamish tries to catch a few, then gives up and amuses himself by blowing out long bursts of breath and watching the dust billow. He grows so involved in this that he eventually stands up on the armchair, bouncing and puffing out air until his lungs ache.

The clicking of a lock down the stairs makes him freeze, and the clumping of footsteps on the stairs sends him falling back down into the seat. He crushes the edge of the armchair in his fists, feeling nervous, because it must be his father come home. Was patient still patient if Hamish had been blowing dust? Well, he’d waited, so perhaps it was.

A man with a mop of dark curls strides into the flat, talking over his shoulder in a deep, loud voice, something about a shoeprint and a Lestrade, yanking a scarf off as he goes. Hamish peeks over the edge of the sofa and recognizes the man from the picture – even though he isn’t wearing a sheet.

“Daddy,” he whispers, remembering Mummy’s words.

Sherlock Holmes stops, freezes, his voice dying mid-word. His fingers release the scarf and it slides down towards the floor. Another man is coming up behind Sherlock, a halfway familiar, stockier man with questions in his voice, but Sherlock is not moving, his face is blank and pale in astonishment, disbelief; his eyes, the same blue as Hamish’s own, have grown wider than teacups. But there are flashes of recognition in them, and Hamish realizes that the man understands who he is.

The scarf Sherlock has dropped flutters to the floor like a dying butterfly, like the last, cautious slivers of blue sky, hidden on the edges of the sunset.

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from _After the Storm_ by Mumford  & Sons and I really jusklje;lakjiejkdjkflj


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